The Courtesan's Daughter (4 page)

“I thought I was giving you what you deserve,” he said, reaching across the space between the matched sofas to cup her face in his hands.

“Given that I have a high opinion of my worth, I have always enjoyed getting what I deserve,” she said with a sly smile as Richborough’s mouth came down upon hers.

Five

CARO sat at her mirror and stared at her face in brutal self-analysis.

She had a good face. She had her mother’s complexion, creamy and smooth, her father’s dark blue eyes, and her mother’s black, softly curled hair.

All in all, she thought she could have a moderately successful run as a courtesan.

Her figure was good, a nice full bust, her hands slender and her fingers well shaped. Beyond that, she did not know how to compare herself to the rest of the female population. She did not know, beyond a clear complexion and a firm bust, what a man found attractive.

But there was clearly something more. Richborough had been insultingly tepid in his response to her completely blatant invitation to debauch her in some small fashion. If the fault was not with her, and she certainly hoped it wasn’t, then the fault must lie with Richborough. He was either profoundly stupid or, and this was not beyond reason, he was afraid of stepping wrong with her mother.
That
was entirely possible. It might have nothing at all to do with her. She might be the most fatally desirable woman since Helen and all those ships.

It might not be a bad idea to ask her brother, John Markham Stuart Grey Trevelyan, the ninth Earl of Dalby, when he got home.

On second thought, it might be a very bad idea.

Judging by Anne’s reaction to her decision, she didn’t suppose Markham would respond any better. It was a good thing that he was out of town or he might try to do something foolish, like talk her out of it. What her mother would do when she found out she did not dare to think, though it was not in Sophia’s style to go about talking people out of things. No, it was much more her style to talk them
into
things. Like marriage.

All the talking in the world was not going to change the fact that no worthy man would take her to wife. The world was reasonable and predictable and logical, and there was nothing reasonable about Caro’s situation. She was the perfectly respectable daughter of a famously unrespectable mother.

No, there was nothing for it. She was going to follow fully in her mother’s footsteps and make her way in the world as a courtesan.

She only hoped she had what it took to be famously unrespectable. Judging by Richborough’s reaction to her, she was not off to a very promising start. The only thing to do was to stop thinking about Richborough and his disappointing performance.

“I thought he’d never leave,” Sophia said, coming into Caro’s bedroom with an exaggerated sigh of exasperation.

“Who?”

“Richborough. He gives a fair imitation of the most debauched man in London. I think he’d die of shame if I told him that he
is
only an imitation and nothing approaching the real thing.”

“I think he’s besotted, Mother.” And if he were, then that might explain why he had behaved so dismally in not even giving the appearance of wanting to seduce her. Why, he hadn’t even tried to kiss her hand, the dullard.

“Do you really think so?” Sophia said, insinuating herself onto a chaise longue covered in blush-colored silk damask. Sophia ran a hand over the back of her hair and smiled like a cat.

“We both think so,” Caro said with a grin, putting off thoughts of the excessively dull Lord Richborough. “How do you do it, Mother? ”

“Do what, darling?”

“How do you make a man besotted? How do you, especially at your age, make a man … want you?”

“I was enjoying this conversation until you said ‘at your age’ in that dumbfounded fashion. Really, Caro, I’m only thirty-four. You make me sound eighty.”

“Which reminds me, you had two children by the age of eighteen. I can scarcely match you in that as I am fully seventeen now.”

“I was precocious.”

“I am on the shelf,” Caro rejoined.

“On the shelf? Don’t be ridiculous, Caro. You are at the peak of your beauty and desirability. Let your mirror guide you in that truth if my words do not.”

“Yes,” Caro said, squirming a bit on her silk-covered cushion. “I’ve been thinking about that, actually, and I’ve come to a decision. I won’t be talked out of it, Mother, I’m telling you that now. I am quite firm, quite decided.”

“Really?” Sophia said, sitting up, eyes alight. “What have you decided? I’m breathless in anticipation.”

“I’m,” she began, but the words suddenly stuck in her throat. Thinking about being a courtesan and talking about it with her mother were entirely different propositions, but Caro was nothing if not forthright and determined, or at least she wanted to believe so. “I’ve decided that, since a worthwhile marriage is out of the question, I’ve decided that …”

“Yes, darling, you’ve decided what?”

“That I want to be … I intend to become … a courtesan.”

The words, far from shining with promise and excitement in the air between them, fell like lead shot to plunge into the parquet floors beneath their feet.

“A courtesan,” Sophia repeated solemnly, blinking.

“Yes. Like you.”

What was intended as a compliment of sorts came out rather more like an indictment.

“Like me? Your declaration has something to do with me?” Sophia said, her voice rising.

“Well, actually, what I meant to say was that, well, it seems a likely start for someone like me.”

“You mean someone of your upbringing, education, and privilege ? ” Sophia said, her voice crisp with sarcasm.

“Someone of my limited prospects,” Caro said.

“You have the prospect of a life of ease before you, married or not, that is certainly true.”

“But I don’t want to live an aimless life, Mother. I want to
do
something, be someone in my own right.”

“In your own right? You clearly have no understanding of what it is to be a courtesan, Caro,” Sophia said stiffly.

“Then tell me. Teach me,” Caro said, rising from her stool and walking to her mother across the luxurious bedroom so that she could sink onto her knees at her mother’s feet. “I want to succeed at something, Mother. I would wish to be a wife to a worthy man, but if I cannot, then let me at least be the object of a worthy man’s attention. Teach me how to make a man want me. Teach me how to make a man besotted.”

Sophia sat back upon the chaise, rubbing her ring finger over her lower lip, deep in thought, her dark eyes upon Caro. Caro could never read her when she assumed that look, that contemplative, lost-in-speculation look. Her father had claimed to have feared that soulful introspection, but she didn’t believe that. Her father had feared nothing, not even the scandal of marrying Sophia Grey, courtesan.

“Does Richborough have anything to do with this?” Sophia asked.

“Nothing at all,” Caro answered honestly.

“And your conversation in the yellow salon with him this morning? ”

“Dull beyond description,” Caro said in brutal honesty.

“You want me to believe you’re serious.”

“I am serious,” Caro answered.

“Then you’re a fool,” Sophia said dismissively.

“Not a fool, Mother, just desperate,” Caro said, meeting her mother’s darkly penetrating gaze. “I want a man to want me. I want to be desired and pursued.”

“And caught,” Sophia said. “To be a courtesan is to be pursued and caught, and caught, and caught.”

“But at least pursued, and caught only when I decide. Isn’t that so?”

“It is usually your empty stomach that decides for you.”

“I just want to be like you, Mother.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, darling. There is no one like me. I arranged that most deliberately,” Sophia said softly, her dark eyes looking quite mysterious all of a sudden.

Caro actually didn’t care what her mother’s eyes did in that precise moment; she was not going to be distracted or discouraged. She
was
going to become a courtesan, and she was going to become famously wonderful at it.

“Mother, I am going to do this. I am going to be a courtesan.”

Sophia smiled and patted her on the head. It was meant to be insulting, and it most definitely was. “You have everything now, at your fingertips, that a courtesan works for. You have money, a lovely home, jewels, protection. What do you think this is, Caro? A game? Women become courtesans because of what they lack. You lack for nothing.”

“I lack purpose.”

“A courtesan’s purpose is to find a protector and to keep him happy.”

“I can do that,” Caro said, hoping she wasn’t blushing.

Sophia shrugged and walked across the room. “You shall have no opportunity to find out. I’ve lived the life you seem determined to pursue. I know what it is. I will not throw my daughter into it. Besides,” she said, turning, her fingers toying with the strand of pearls at her throat, “I have done what you have deemed impossible. I have arranged a marriage for you.”

“You have? When? With whom?”

“I have, just now, with Lord Ashdon, heir to the Earl of Westlin. A tidy match, wouldn’t you agree?”

Caro walked toward her mother, the pearled light of London casting gentle light upon them both. “He offered for me?”

“We have reached a marriage arrangement.”

That was rather too carefully worded for comfort.

“He did not approach you?”

Sophia shrugged and turned from Caro to walk over to the fireplace where she fussed with the arrangement of tulips there. As a very strict rule, Sophia did not fuss.

“How was this arrangement proposed?” Caro asked.

“If you must know, he had some outstanding debts, which I covered, and now, well, darling, I hoped you’d be happy. I paid his debts and now he is going to marry you. Isn’t that lovely? You could hardly wish for a better match, and he is both young and handsome enough to credit you.”

“You
bought
me a husband?” Caro sputtered.

“Yes. Isn’t it delicious?” Sophia said smoothly, smiling in delight. “And he’s all yours. Now, I was thinking that the wedding could be six weeks from Tuesday. Wouldn’t Denmark be lovely for your honeymoon? ”

“Mother, I am
not
going to marry a man you had to
buy
for me!”

“Why ever not?” Sophia said. “How else do you think marriages are made if not on a solid financial foundation?”

“Not everything is about money!”

Sophia laughed. “And you thought to be a courtesan? Darling, you obviously don’t have the necessary commercial interests that drive such an enterprise. Best you marry and see to producing lots of lovely grandchildren for me.”

“I am not going to marry him,” Caro said stiffly, staring her mother down.

Sophia was not in the habit of being stared down and she gave every appearance of being disinclined to learn.

“But I’ve already paid for him,” Sophia said. “He’s yours, darling, all you need to do is simply collect him.”

“Then you’ll have to return him, or whatever it is one does with unwanted … merchandise!” Caro snapped.

“Well,” Sophia said, a mild scowl forming between her brows, “I certainly never anticipated this. I suppose I shall have to tell him, or would you rather?”

“No, I think you should do it. I should die of shame to look at him.”

“Now, Caro, are you completely certain this is what you want, because I don’t think I can possibly arrange to buy another husband for you. This took quite a bit of effort and planning and just plain good fortune on my part.”

“Mother,
please
. Just do it. Make him go away. I’d like us both to pretend that this never happened.”

“If that’s what you want,” Sophia said, shaking her head ruefully and walking toward the bedroom door. “But I will not tolerate any more of your ridiculousness about becoming a courtesan. I forbid you mention it again, do you understand?”

“Yes, Mother,” Caro said serenely. “I promise to never mention it again.”

Which, of course, wasn’t at all to the point.

Six

“I’M sorry, Lord Ashdon, but she just won’t have you,” Sophia said.

The daughter of a courtesan would not have
him
? Was this the world as it was meant to run? It was most definitely not.

“Pardon me, madam?” he said crisply, standing almost at attention in her famed white salon. As the story went, Sophia had once been gifted with a rare and priceless porcelain cup, fully two hundred years old, out of the depths of mysterious China. The blanc de Chine cup was worth a tidy fortune and the room had been designed to showcase it. Only those few who had danced their way into the next level of intimacy were allowed into the white salon. The parquet floors were waxed to a dark sheen, like a lake at midnight, while her furnishings were all of milk blue damask and ice white velvet, ice floes on a winter lake, pristine and coldly beautiful, much like the famed lady herself.

She turned to face him, a smile of delicate chagrin on her fine-boned face, her dark eyes sympathetic. Did the daughter look like the mother?

He had seen her once or twice, at the opera, on Bond Street, but that was all. He knew her name: Caroline. He knew her lineage: questionable. He knew her dowry: substantial.

And he knew her mother. Or of her, be it better said.

Who lived within Society who did not know Sophia in one manner or another?

She had arrived in London in 1781, from the American colonies it was rumored, though he had trouble believing that. Sophia Grey had charmed and beguiled the most sophisticated, the most debauched men of her day, and a girl from a colonial backwater could hardly have done that. Others said that she was Parisian, the daughter of an old aristocrat fallen into bad ways and hard times. That he could more readily believe because her French was flawless and her manner continental. There was about her that inbred arrogance of the aristocrat, a bone-deep belief in her own superiority and her own sublime worth. It was that arrogance, coupled with her aristocratic beauty, which had resulted in her fabled price.